Arrival and Departure

Posted on Tue Aug 1st, 2023 @ 1:55am by Commander Raiden Kosugi & Captain David Hawkins

Mission: The Goddess
Timeline: Back Post
1252 words - 2.5 OF Standard Post Measure

//ON//

Each distant twinkle was only visible for the briefest moment—popping into existence, smearing across the empty blackness, then fading away into the unknown. Each one a star, a planet, maybe a distant nebula. Each one a possibility. Most people would find that fascinating, but for Rhyala it was closer to insulting. When your people were reduced to nomads—driven from their homes and all but forgotten—it was easy to look out into the expanse and wonder how you ended up with so little.

She sighed and turned away from the viewscreen, letting her eyes fall instead on the almost empty room around her. It was small, with room for maybe twenty people around several small tables and a long bar against the near wall. The lights were dimmed, and it was quiet. Rhyala was essentially alone—a young Andorian officer was asleep in a chair at the far end of the room.

Rhyala envied the young officer, she hadn’t slept well for days. The anxiety of a new assignment had worn her nerves raw. She couldn’t help but replay a string of poor first impressions in her head. Smart but obstinate, talented but egotistic, believes she knows better than her superiors. It was always the same. Could she really do better this time? Had anything really changed?

She pushed herself up from her seat and looked down at the large duffel on the floor. The rest of her things were stored somewhere on a lower deck. But the only things she really valued were stuffed inside the heavy Starfleet-issued bag she chose to lug around with her for the last week. She stepped around the duffel and walked slowly to the back wall, stopping in front of another viewscreen showing the stars blurring past as the vessel cruised along at warp.

Rhyala let her eyes unfocus from the stars and instead fix on the somewhat reflective screen itself. Staring back at her was a round face framed in curly, shoulder-length black hair. Thin lips were pursed into a slight smirk, a subtly-rounded nose was scrunched up, and thin, dark eyebrows were narrowed down. She couldn’t make out the rose-hued skin or the pale green eyes—but she knew they were there just the same. Rhyala’s face showed annoyance, and she knew exactly why. She was annoyed with herself.

Sure, she told herself that she was annoyed because the dilithium disbursement manifold on the Intrepid class ship was vibrating slightly out-of-pitch. And it was. It was almost certainly reducing the flow to the plasma distributors and probably cutting the ship’s efficiency above warp 5 by at least half a percent. But that wasn’t the real problem. Besides, Rhyala was just a passenger here—cargo to be dropped off at the Gladiator. She wasn’t an engineer on this ship and the warp core wasn’t her responsibility.

No, Rhyala was annoyed because she was a walking contradiction and she knew it. She was half Human and half El-Aurian. But despite being raised on Earth, she always considered herself to be El-Aurian, part of the ancient people now spread thin across the galaxy. But despite considering herself more El-Aurian, she knew she didn’t behave that way.
Rhyala lacked many of the more peculiar traits of her El-Aurian mother. She couldn’t project her consciousness, she wasn’t empathic, and as far as she knew she lacked any particular sensitivity to the fabric of spacetime. But she did appear to inherit one unique trait. At almost 50 years old, Rhyala looked no different than the average human in their mid-20s. And while she had no idea how long she would ultimately live, her lifespan had already proved equal parts blessing and curse. When Rhyala entered Starfleet Academy she had decades of experience in engineering, science, and medicine. She had simply spent more time learning and doing than even most of her instructors.

This is where Rhyala was a contradiction. An El-Aurian would prefer to listen, to hear, to learn. But not Rhyala. She had been impatient and egotistical. She preferred to act on her own knowledge than wait and see what else there might be to learn. So she graduated from the academy with top academic marks and practical scores—except when teamwork was required. And from that one simple question began to follow her around, was she more of an asset than a liability in an environment that placed enormous value on teamwork?

She sighed, shook her head, and began to slowly pace around the small room—making sure to walk softly and not wake the Andorian still fast asleep, antennae gently twitching as they dreamed.

Rhyala had made progress during her time on the Bonchune. She wasn’t the hot-headed know-it-all that graduated from the Academy. But she was still impatient and still struggled to listen first and act second. And despite her excellent technical evaluations, her time on the Bonchune was lonely … and she couldn’t help but wonder whether the transfer was a command staff’s effort to be rid of her.

She made her way back to her chair and dropped her short, lean frame down into the plush padding. She didn’t want to hide her talents and she didn’t want to pretend not to know what she was doing just to stoke other officers’ egos. But she also didn’t want to spend the next few years friendless and the subject of irritated whispers by every superior.
Rhyala reached down and unzipped her duffel. She rummaged for a moment then pulled out a thin metal disc covered in ridges. Her mother told her it was used by acnient El-Aurians in meditation—an aid to calming the mind and building patience. She had no idea if that was true, but using it seemed to help either way. Rhyala closed her eyes and ran her fingers back and forth over the ridges, but before she could focus she felt the ship decelerate. Dropping out of warp shouldn’t be that noticeable, she thought, the ship’s inertial dampeners are out of….

Before she could finish the thought her comm badge chirped to life.

“Ops to Lieutenant J/G Ward.”

Rhyalla opened her eyes, tucked the disc back in her duffel, then tapped her badge.

“Ward here.”

“We’ve rendezvoused with the Gladiator, ma’am. We’ve had an ops team bring your luggage to transporter room 2. Whenever you’re ready.”

“Copy.” She was about to leave it there when her past social failings creeped into her mind once more. “Thank you. I’ll be right down,” she finished.

She turned and looked out the viewscreen next to her. The view was largely unchanged, except that the distant stars were no longer blurring past.

“Computer, show port view.”

In in instant the view changed and Rhyalla saw the massive, sleek profile of the Sovereign-class Gladiator sitting still against the darkness. It was an impressive sight. And, for an engineer, a tantalizing one. For the first time in days a slight smile took over her face as excitement began to push past anxiety.

Rhyalla stood up and hoisted her duffel onto a narrow shoulder. She took one last look at the peacefully slumbering Andorian.

“If only all my social interactions went this well” Rhyalla said softly. And with a snicker she made her way out of the lounge and started off toward transporter room 2 and a new chapter of her life.

//END//